Developing Spreadsheet-Based Decision Support Systems

by Michelle M.H. Seref, Wayne L. Winston

A decision support system is an intelligent information system that uses data, models it, processes or analyzes it using problem-specific methodologies, and assists the user in the decision-making process through a graphical user interface. Developing Spreadsheet-Based Decision Support Systems is a comprehensive book that describes how to build decision support systems using the Excel spreadsheet framework and the VBA programming language. This book illustrates complete decision support development applications through several case studies arising in Operations Research, Industrial Engineering, Management, and Business Administration. The main contribution of the book is to present all the techniques needed to build complete Excel-based decision support systems in a highly accessible manner through numerous hands-on examples and case studies. This book is ideally suited as a textbook for teaching undergraduate- and graduate-level courses in any branch of science, engineering, and management and can also be used as a supplementary reference book or a self-study manual. The book contains three Part I - Excel This part presents an overview of Excel basic and extended functionalities. The basic functionality topics include referencing and names, functions and formulas, charts, and pivot tables. The extended functionality topics include statistical analysis, the Solver and modeling, simulation, and working with large datasets. Part II - VBA for This part presents an overview of programming in VBA and manipulating Excel objects. Covered topics include macros, programming structures, building user interfaces, and using VBA for optimization and simulation. Part III - Case This part presents several case studies of decision support systems arising in different application settings. These case studies include inventory management, retirement planning, reliability analysis, warehouse layout, facility location, forecasting, and portfolio management.

910 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2007